Ocean and Climate Change

The boating community exists in the boundary where land meets water, and today that boundary’s location is changing due to the impacts of global warming.

Human induced climate change threatens coastal and marine ecosystems through sea-level rise, acidification, and changes in weather patterns and water temperatures. These changes will also seriously alter coastal development, the reliability of ocean shipping, coastal recreation and marine activities such as oil platforms and aquaculture, thus adding economic risks. Oceans and climate are inextricably linked and oceans play a fundamental role in mitigating climate change by serving as a major heat and carbon sink. Oceans also bear the brunt of climate change, as evidenced by growing acidification, sea level increase, and changes in temperature and currents, all of which in turn impact the health of marine species, ecosystems, and our coastal communities. As concerns about climate change increase, the interrelationship between oceans and climate change must by recognized, understood, and incorporated into climate change policies.

There are two main causes of climate changes – natural causes and human activities. Natural causes have influenced the earth’s climates such as volcanic eruptions, ocean current, the earth’s orbital changes and solar variations. The eruptions of volcanoes cause a cooling effect on the earth. When a volcano erupts it throws out large volumes of sulphur dioxide (SO2), water vapour, dust, and ash into the atmosphere. The volcano eruptions will affect the climatic pattern for years although the eruptions occur in a few days. The sulphur dioxide gas will reach the upper level of the atmosphere. The tiny particles, dusts and ashes will block the incoming sun rays and this will leads to cooling at the atmosphere. This is because the bouncing of sunlight to the space is cooling the atmosphere of the earth. Furthermore, ocean current is one of the natural cause that affecting climate changes. The ocean is the major component of the climate system. The oceans cover about 71% of the earth and absorb about twice as much of the sun’s radiation as the atmosphere or the land surface. Winds push horizontally against the sea surface and drive ocean current patterns. Besides that, the oceans also play an important role of the concentration of carbon dioxide. The changes in ocean circulation will affect the climate through the movement of carbon dioxide into or out of the atmosphere. Moreover, another cause that affects climate changes is the earth’s orbital changes. The earth makes one full orbit around the sun every year. If there is no tilt we will not experience seasons. Changes in the tilt of the earth can affect the severity of the seasons. For example, if there is more tilt means we will experience warmer summers and colder winters and if there is less tilt means we will experience cooler summers and milder winters.

Furthermore, climate changes also will affect human’s mind and behaviour psychologically. Climate changes will affect human’s behaviour such as consumption, energy use and population growth. Besides that, climate changes also impact psychosocial and mental health including stress, guilty, anxiety to adapt and cope with the new changing weathers. The climate changes will cause the increase of social disorder such as post traumatic disorder, suicide, stress, abuse, violence and anxiety. Therefore, climate changes will be giving a great impact on the human’s psychological lives.

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